Streetcar standoff

San Antonio’s downtown streetcar system may be years away from completion, but controversy about the rail project is already rolling into town. On Wednesday, notorious anti-rail expert Randal O’Toole took his anti-streetcar report all over San Antonio. VIA Metroplitan Transit, which will build and maintain the streetcar system, quickly fired back. You can read about the brouhaha here.

Generally, O’Toole believes rail projects, urban planning and downtowns are all bad things. People love their personal vehicles, he said, and as soon as they could afford them, they drove as fast as they could out to the suburbs, making downtowns obsolete. Buses are cheaper, he said, and more flexible than rail projects.

If you happen to call public transit experts about O’Toole, as this reporter did yesterday, the initial reaction involves a pause, a sigh, and a “Yes, I know of him,” kind of answer, an off-the-record expression of disbelief at his beliefs, and then a measured, politically correct, on-the-record response.

It’s always hard to parse through reports like the one O’Toole wrote about San Antonio (repurposed from a previous report, called “The Great Streetcar Conspiracy.”) — what’s a legitimate concern, and has anything been taken out of context? And can you debate the value of streetcars, yet still disagree with some of his points?

Today, I was emailed another report on streetcars, this one by transit experts Rick Gustafson, executive director of Portland Streetcar, and Eric Hovee, a consultant out of Washington who works a lot on transit projects. The pair refuted many of the points O’Toole made in “The Great Streetcar Conspiracy,” writing that his analysis “includes so many misleading and biased interpretations that a response to the specific statements is necessary.” (Note 1: Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff sent the report to one of my colleagues, who sent it to me. He LOVES streetcar, so it’s clear why he’d send this report our way; Note 2: Hovee has done presentations on transit oriented development in San Antonio, according to his bio). I’ll examine a few of their arguments here, but here’s a link to their report if you want to read even more. A reminder: the study these two experts are discussing is NOT the exact report released in San Antonio yesterday, but several of the points are the same.

O’Toole’s point: Almost no new developments took place (in Portland) on portions of the streetcar route where developers received no subsidies. In that vein, he also says that the only reason economic development has occurred in Portland is because of large subsidies.

Gustafson and Hovee’s responses: O’Toole, they write, looked at a part of the streetcar line in a neighborhood that, they say, was already substantially developed when rail got there. One part that was undeveloped is “now moving toward mixed use redevelopment predicated on further streetcar extension.” They provide a map that shows the slew of new developments along the streetcar line. They argue that streetcar was central to the strategy of revitalizing Portland’s Pearl District, adding that “rates of new development were appreciably greater for properties in closest proximity to streetcar service.”

O’Toole’s point: Streetcars cost roughly twice as much to operate, per vehicle mile, as buses.

Gustafson and Hovee’s response: The Federal Transit Administration has proposed measuring cost effectiveness by cost per ride. But O’Toole compares cost per street mile for streetcar, which they say is a more biased view. According to their calculations, it costs $1.43 per ride on the Portland streetcar. The average cost per ride on the Portland bus is $2.82.

O’Toole’s point: An Oregon-based company is using federal Buy America rules to convince other cities they should pursue streetcar; and that without those federal rules, cities would buy cheaper European streetcars.

Gustafson and Hovee’s response: More than 80 cities are doing streetcar feasibility studies, they write, and many of them aren’t using federal money. They say European streetcars are not cheaper, and they write that the Buy America rules assures U.S. jobs.

There are many more points in this report, and there are many in O’Toole’s. And he keeps on taking his message across Texas — he was scheduled to be in Austin Thursday, to speak with Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, House Speaker Joe Straus and Texas Department of Transportation Executive Director Phil Wilson.